Labor reform: Precarious work and the challenges for unions

Abstract

The paper proposes to identify the initial impacts of the labor reform on trade unionism, in a context that is unfavorable to workers and to collective action, resulting from the transformations in the reconfiguration of the working classes, with the growth of precariousness and crisis of the labor market. The analysis focuses on the impacts of this reconfiguration of the working classes and the fragmentation of trade unions, as well as the impacts of the labor reform on union strategies and actions and on collective negotiation. The methodology combined quantitative labor market research with documents (collectives work contracts, commercial and trade union press materials) and participant observation. The results show that the trade unions are searching to adapt to the new context with some substantive innovations in action and organization. The latest negotiations have been, at the same time, spaces of resistance and legitimization of the content of the reform.